Engaged!

Friday August 17th, the day after I flew home from Toronto, was a wonderful day.  I woke up early next to my sweetie, in our giant comfortable bed with the sun shining in the window and the birds singing outside.  We got up, went and got some coffee and headed to the store to buy something for breakfast.  We got back to our beautiful little apartment and cooked up a feast of pancakes, hash-browns, and sausages.  Afterwards we went out to sit on our porch, the sun was still rising and casting its glow on the yard,  the air was fresh, and I was home.  I was so incredibly happy, I told Joel that this was the perfect day.  Joel went inside to grab a drink and when he came back out we talked of our time away from each other and he talked of the time he spent reflecting on his life while in Utah.  His voice was soft and low and he was saying such sweet things about me and our relationship, about how I make him a better man and that he likes who he is when he is with me and that he doesn't ever want to lose that.  I was getting a bit teary eyed listening to him and then he said slowly and sweetly "So, I asked your father if..." and at the same time he began to reach into his pocket, and then he started to get down on one knee as he continued to speak, and then it was all over for me.  Joel opened the little black box and inside was the most perfect ring, at that point I was already crying and I may have cut off his proposal a bit with my enthusiastic yes.  I was so happy, gosh I'm still so happy.  Joel said he had his doubts about whether I would say yes, but there was no doubt for me there was not even a moment of hesitation. 

We have been together for five years and we've lived together nearly that long.  Over the summer we both had the same thought of how the titles of "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" are not substantial enough to describe our relationship.  Fiance sounds much better don't you think?

That's my ring!  I have a diamond (my very first diamond actually) and it's gorgeous and yes I'm going to brag about it.  How could I not marry a guy who shops all over, eventually driving two and a half hours to a pawn shop to hunt down this perfect ring.  And it is perfect, except it needs to be resized, but I'm not ready to hand it over for that yet.

XoXo

Jessa

4 Days!

I took a walk through campus today.  Tomorrow I'm heading to Niagara Falls.  4 days until I'm HOME!

Xoxo
Jessa

I'm done, I'm done!

I finished my Medical Biophysics Summer Student Program.  Let's do a little recap and info session on this program:

The University of Toronto's Department of Medical Biophysics (MBP) has been running a summer student  program since the 1960's.  Every summer they select 50 undergrad students for this program.  There are many labs throughout Toronto that are part of the MBP department and one lab will look through the applicants and select one student to work in their lab.  The lab that Chris and I ended working in is that of Dr. Medin.  Dr. Medin graduated from the University Chris and I go to, UW Parkside.  Due to this connection Dr. Medin wanted to open up the MBP summer program to Parkside students.  Dr. Medin and one of my Parkside professors set up an initial application to select two Parkside students who would be allowed to apply to the MBP program.  Chris and I were selected and we both then applied to the MBP program.  After waiting for a while and not being selected by any other lab Dr. Medin said he would take us in.

Me and Mathilde at work

Dr. Medin's lab has several projects: some people are working on developing a prostate cancer vaccine, some are working on Fabry's disease, and some are working on Farber's disease.  Chris and I were assigned to work with a PhD student, Shaalee, who is working on Farber's disease.  I have done lots of different experiments, I've cultured cells, I was trained to use a laser scanning confocal microscope, I've done PCRs, Western blots, protein assays, mouse dissections, isolated primary cells, molecular subcloning, I even made viruses that will be used for gene therapy!

So, to sum it all up, I completed my 13 weeks of work, I did a presentation of the work I had done during our weekly lab meeting, Chris and I did a presentation of a journal article for our weekly lab meeting, and then lastly I made and presented a poster along with 30 other MBP summer students.  I was even selected as a finalist, which meant I was in the top five!

Me and my PI, Dr. Medin

So, now I'm done!  I have some free time and then on Thursday I will be home! :)

Weekend Fun

On Saturday I did a little shopping in Kensington Market, which is an area of Toronto full of neat little shops, handcrafted gifts, and many vegetarian and gluten free restaurants.  I have some photos that I'll try to get up later.  Satuday night was the Graduate House's Birthday party.  There was pizza, cake, a licensed bar, and a dj.  It was a great night full of dancing and fun.

Today a group of us had another beach adventure.  We headed to the usual spot, Ward's Island beach and enjoyed some sun, until the giant storm rolled in...

On the ferry.

Arriving at the Island.

Me and the group.

The storm.

The rain started and suddenly everyone wanted to sit by me. Strange.

We took cover at the Island cafe for the worst of the storm.

The subway home.

Wasaga Beach

Last week a few friends and I planned a road trip to Wasaga Beach.  The beach is about 2 hours north of Toronto and it is apparently the longest stretch of freshwater beach in the WORLD!  How could we possibly not visit?

We left for the beach bright and early on Saturday morning to avoid traffic, thankfully we didn't have to worry about traffic at all due to the dark ominous skies and pouring rain.

What a beautiful day for the beach!

Mathilde

Chris and Franz played with their Canada flag football the whole ride there.

Aline and Yvonne.  Don't worry, I watched the road through the viewfinder.

Road trip!

It rained the entire car ride up and drizzled on us as we carried the cooler full of drinks and bags full of towels and sunblock down onto the wet sand.

Lunch

We made sand castles in the cold wet sand, then as I shivered and my lips began to take on a purple tinge the clouds blew over, the sun came out, and it became a perfect day at the beach.  We played a little volleyball and frisbee, we shopped at the beach side shops, and soaked up the sun.  We left at 7pm, stopped at Wendy's for some dinner, and then we spent the rest of the night dancing at a club downtown (that's right, I went clubbing, don't look so shocked).

Our sandcastles survived the entire day.

The boys had a long day.

Happy Wednesday!
Sincerely,
Jessa

Walk to work

Every weekday I walk 25 minutes to and from work.  I have a couple different routes, but all of them include walking through the U of T campus.  It's a beautiful walk through the campus's many historic buildings.  Here are a few shots from my walk.  I think I'll take more tomorrow.

Street car with my building in the background

The CN tower and the Spring Graduates lining up at the convocation plaza

Canada Day

Last weekend was a 3 day weekend thanks to Canada Day!  On Saturday a group of us, including Benedict, Peter, Franz, Yvonne, Chris, Mathilde, and myself went to the Islands.  We went to Ward's Island beach again and we swam, snacked, laid around, and people watched.  We then walked to the other side of the island where we saw the oldest lighthouse on the great lakes and some live music amidst the Wisconsin-esque scenery.  When we finally got home we walked to the Metro and picked up some burgers, hotdogs, potato salad, and sweet potatoes (which Chris and I had to teach the foreigners how to eat) and we went back to grad house and grilled out on the patio.  It was the perfect way to end the day.  

On Sunday Yvonne and I went to the Gay Pride Parade which was quite the experience.  There was so much celebrating and cheering, costumes and birthday suites, water-guns, water-balloons, free condoms, rainbows, confetti, dancing, and most of all, pride.  Following the parade Yvonne and I met up with Aline and we walked and got to Hero Burgers (gluten free buns people), and then decided we would go to Aline's "Canadian parent's" house to swim in her pool and watch fireworks.  Chris and Franz came too and we swam for a bit, walked to get pizza, and sat in the grass in Aline's front yard to watch the fireworks that her Canadian Dad bought.  It was a stark contrast to the Fourth of July, the neighborhood was mostly quite with very few decorations.  Maybe everyone went to Ottawa?  Either way it was a great day and we all went home exhausted.

Monday was adventure day.  Aline and Yvonne took me on a bike tour of Toronto.  I rented a bixi bike (Toronto's rent-a-bike system) and we biked up to Don Valley park, which borders the river.  We stopped for a picnic in the woods and later for slushies in town.  Finally we reached the beach we had been searching for, a tiny little beach next to the river that you can't even see from the bike trail.  It was perfect for laying in the sun and climbing on the rocks in the river.  Eventually we biked back downtown and had dinner and drinks with Siebe on the patio of the Town Crier.  In the end we biked for at least six hours.  My legs and butt are a bit sore, but it was so worth it.

Beach:

Bike Tour: